Monday 18 August 2014

We will be a little quiet over the next week ...


Over the rest of this week and next we are sailing off to our new location.  

We are moving all the way from Bedfordshire to Sunny Devon.  We have planned the move over the bank holiday so that the business will suffer as little disruption as possible.  

You will still be able to place orders on line and your orders will still be dispatched as usual throughout this period.  

From Thursday 21st August - Tuesday 26th August we will have a limited telephone service and will not be able to take any telephone orders or payments during this time (you will be able to call us on 01462 810004 and leave a message and we will come back to you as soon as we can).  

From Wednesday 27th August we will be back to normal and our new telephone number will be 01409 261573.  

We will have all of this information on the website as well so you do not need to remember anything.

I will be a little quiet on the Blog front this week and probably next but I do have scheduled newsletters coming out so you won't miss out on this weeks prize draw and other special offers.

I hope that you have a lovely Bank Holiday and we will be back next Wednesday ready with lots of Autumn offers and Christmas goodies!

Happy Crafting
Teresa






Thursday 14 August 2014

Customer showcase ..

I love it when you send us images of the projects that you have created with your purchases from us.  

Today I wanted to share this lovely card created by the very talented Merethe in Norway using the Christmas Decorative Holly Rings set from Tonic Studios.

 Created by Merethe Arstein  - majaapia.blogspot.no

The card and colours are absolutely beautiful.  If you have not come across Merethe's Blog before do pop over and take a look.  She has some wonderful creations to inspire us all - the link is on the picture!

Happy crafting!

Greenhouse card ...




With Summer in full swing now I thought that it would be nice to create a card for any gardeners who have Birthdays coming up soon and when I saw the 'I Love My Garden' stamp set from Woodware I knew that I wanted to create a garden scene around a greenhouse.


The card begins with a 5x7" brown card base.  With the spine on the left hand side find the center point of the short side (at the top) and make a mark.  Measure 6cm down from the top on either side and make another two marks.  Using a pencil join the outer marks to the mark in the center at the top as shown.  This will create the roof of the greenhouse. 


Using the picture as a guide draw in the rest of the greenhouse with a pencil and ruler.  The frame could be as thick or thin as you would like but my frame was 1/4" thick because I used the measuring lines on my cutting mat which happen to be in inches rather than centimeters.  {Don't worry about the pencil marks as these will rub off later}.  This frame is only a guide and you could create yours in any way that you want.  The exact placement of the windows or door etc do not really matter but as a guide I started my door 3cm in from each edge of the card.


Once you have drawn in the Greenhouse.  Use a knife and ruler to trim the top of the roof (cutting through both the front and back of the card).  

Once you have done this, open your card out and continue to cut out the panels of the Greenhouse. REMEMBER TO OPEN YOUR CARD AT THIS POINT OR LIKE ME YOU WILL HAVE TO START ALL OVER AGAIN!


Once all cut out I used a white pencil to add a little depth around the frame.


Take a piece of acetate, trim to size and adhere to the back of the frame. 

I used a glue pen to stick the acetate to the frame.  You could see the glue behind so I would suggest that if you were going to stick the acetate this way use the frame to trace out a second frame.  Cut this out and then back your acetate with the second frame.  This way your acetate will be sandwiched between the two frames.  Alternatively use Invisi Dots for Vellum to stick the acetate as the adhesive will not be so obvious.


Take the I Love My Garden stamp set and stamp the images that you want with a black Staz On ink pad (so that you can watercolour the designs).

I painted the images with my Distress Markers by scribbling the thick end onto my acrylic stamping block  and then picking up the ink with a waterbrush to apply to the images.  Once this has dried I added a little extra detail with the same pack of pencils that I took the white pencil from earlier.


Begin to stick the images around the frame with the glue pen or invisi dots (if you don't want the adhesive to show through the acetate).


The sentiment stamp is from another Woodware stamp set - Relatives which was stamped onto white cardstock with the Staz On.  This was trimmed and mounted onto more brown card.  Mini brads were added in the top corners of the sign to look like nails and this was then stuck to the card.


The flowers were created by using a Multi Flower punch from Woodware and some sheets of paper from the Moments and Memories 6x6 Pad from Carta Bella.


I punched lots of flowers (probably used the punch about 8-9 times to get a pile of flowers). If you wonder where the green flowers come from in the picture below - the sheets of paper are double sided!


The smaller flowers were kept to stick on the front of the card (see the first picture).  The larger flowers were used to stick around a punched out circle inside the card.  This white circle could be used to write on when you send the card.


A little white gel pen inside the card and some gems on the flowers on the front of the card and the card is complete.




Hope you like it!  














Sunday 3 August 2014

A Midsummer's day themed card.

For those of you who follow this blog regularly you will know that I quite often use Woodware stamps in my projects. There is a wonderful selection of designs to choose from.  They always give a super impression when stamped and they are always such good value.  

Having said all of that you can imagine how delighted I was when the lovely Dorothy from Woodware approached me and asked if I would choose the topic for their regular 'weekly project theme' over on their Blog as well as design a themed card for them to share with their readers.

I chose is 'A Midsummer's day' for my theme and here is my card design...





The card gives a lovely 3D effect but will lie flat to go in an envelope.

materials used:



Begin the card by cutting 2 blue squares and 2 beige squares of card from the Textura cardstock paper pads. Each square will need to be 4.5cm x 4.5cm



Use a corner rounder to round the two opposite corners on each piece of cardstock.



You will see that when positioned they will look a little like petals on a flower (note there are only three here and you will need four).  


Once you have all four pieces take the Going to Seed stamp and stamp part of the design onto each petal.  {Note: When I stamped I used the tip of the stamp so that the stamped area was not too crowded}.

Once you have stamped all four pieces with a black Brilliance ink pad edge with a little peanut brittle ink and a blending sponge and stick all four pieces in a square towards the top of the base card with double sided tape.

{see first picture for guidance on how to position the petals}



For the moment you can set the base card aside so that you can move onto the butterfly.

This is created by stamping the butterfly from the Butterfly collage art stamp set onto white cardstock with the Peanut brittle memento and then again onto acetate with a Black Stazon ink pad.  

{Note: Stamping onto acetate will take a little practice as it is quite easy for the stamp to slip as you apply the image.  It may help to lightly sand the acetate first with a sanding block to create a little more texture before stamping.  Alternatively it may help to ink up the stamp and then lay it upside down on the table(with the stamped image upper most) place the acetate over the top of the stamp pressing down lightly with another acrylic block or something else that is hard and flat.}

Once you have stamped both images trim them out leaving a small edge all around. You will see that I left the antennae on the acetate butterfly but cut them off on the brown butterfly.


There are several ways to attach the acetate butterfly to the one below.  You could use a brad, glue or tape although the later methods might not be particularly neat with the adhesive or tape showing through etc.

Using a stapler to hold the acetate butterfly in place is a secure method and your butterfly is unlikely to come off when the card goes through the post.

 To apply, take the acetate butterfly and fold it in the middle (give it a good crease at this stage).  

Open the butterfly out and hold it in place over the cardstock butterfly (don't worry if you have not cut the two pieces exactly the same and they do not match up exactly). Push the stapler over the butterfly (from the side so that the staple is vertical) and staple both butterflies together over the body area.  Once stuck refold the butterfly to add lift.

This can then be stuck to the card as shown in the first picture with double sided tape.  I don't mind the look of the staple but you can easily cover this if you are not so keen with a few self adhesive pearls (if the pearls do not stick to your staple very well then a touch of liquid glue underneath them will do the trick).


The Going to Seed Stamp set does contain a choice of sentiments that you could use but I love my Special Wishes stamp set and so used the 'Best Wishes' sentiment from there.  This was stamped with a black Brilliance ink pad.

Finally I used a white gel pen to add a stitched effect along the spine of the card and around the petals.

*****

I hope that you enjoy having a go at the card.  If anyone has any specific problems or queries then feel free to drop me an e-mail and I will try to help.

Happy crafting!